Breaking the Ice
by Veterization
Summary: Stiles/Derek AU oneshot. Where Stiles is a figure skater turned pair skater who gets teamed up with has-been skater Derek Hale, and neither of them are exactly pleased.


_Disclaimer: _I do not own Teen Wolf. There are some pieces of altered dialogue from 1x02 and 2x04 in here that I don't own.

_Notes: _Okay guys, I cooked this idea up watching figure skating in the middle of the night, so I really can't be blamed for how absolutely idiotic it is.

Now, all of my knowledge about figure skating comes from the snippets I've seen of in the Olympics, my best friend Google, and Wikipedia's list of figure skating terms, so if there are any experts out there reading this, I'M SO SORRY. Really.

That being said, I KNOW that male/male pair skating isn't common, and from what I've read, it isn't even allowed, so we have to pretend that this story takes place in a world where this isn't the case. Just go with it._  
_

* * *

When Stiles is young, prepubescent and much too gangly for his own limbs, he goes to a birthday party with twelve other squeaky-voiced kids in his grade and they go ice skating, or more accurately, find over fifty ways to imaginatively fall on their asses. He sees Lydia Martin there, her head full of messy curls too big for her tiny body, and watches her skate much more gracefully than any of the others. She's a natural on her skates and seems to become one entity with the ice, and Stiles thinks that now he has a surefire way of getting Lydia to notice him, fall in love with him, and eventually have his four children.

He cooks the idea up in fourth grade, but it somehow survives. He tells his dad he wants to take skating lessons and his dad, although understandably worried about someone as prone to fumbling and clumsiness as his son moving from the flat earth to a slick ice rink, encourages his athleticism and agrees. It's the most elaborate plan Stiles has ever come up with to woo a girl, and naturally, it doesn't work.

Skating, however, he gets better at.

His dad suggests he start doing tournaments and Stiles, mildly bored of finishing Halo with Scott twice in under a few months, decides it's a good idea to try to figure out exactly how good at ice skating he is. He competes in a cute little town contest where about twenty other people twirl along to dramatic movie soundtracks and he goes home with a shiny gold medal that his dad hangs on the fridge with a magnet.

As he starts getting older, he seeks more competitions and keeps doing well and keeps bringing home massive medals to wear around his neck until one day, over a greasy lunch, his dad says, "why don't you go to the Olympics?" and Stiles starts looking at competing nationally.

* * *

"Stilinksi, you're gonna wanna kiss me after I tell you this fantastic news," Coach Finstock tells him on a chilly Monday afternoon of training. "But I must ask you to refrain or I might break your face, and we all know that's your moneymaker."

"What's the news?"

"I have something that will finally spice up your utterly boring performance," Finstock breezes directly over the insult, still manically grinning as if the gears in his brain can't turn fast enough. Stiles is still a little concerned with that last bit.

"Hold on, my _utterly boring_ performance?"

Finstock falters for a moment, beam falling from his face, "C'mon, Stilinski, I can't have been the only one to notice that the judges aren't gonna keep falling for your cute little pancake spins every single year. At the rate we're going the only way we could win sectionals is if your routine involved you carrying a confetti cannon."

"Coach, _you're_ the one who designs my routine," Stiles points out, but Finstock doesn't seem to worry himself about claiming responsibility.

"Have I hurt your feelings?" Finstock pauses, quickly recovering with a hard shake of Stiles' chin in his forefinger and thumb. "Get over it. I came up with the perfect plan to get you back in the judges' eyes."

"And it's not a confetti cannon?"

"Much better. You're gonna be pairing up with Derek Hale."

* * *

Stiles has heard of Derek Hale before. Anybody who owns a pair of skates generally does, for he was the Beacon Hills figure skating prodigy when he went to the Olympics as part of a pair alongside Kate Argent and even blew the Asians out of the water, and Stiles knows after watching quite a few hours of skating competitions on television that there's nobody quite like the Asians when it comes to being graceful and cunning on the ice. He moves like a gazelle and is definitely not lacking in muscle to stare at underneath those skin-tight costumes, and paired with his unbeatable triple Axel and a face that could crumble mountains, Derek Hale had his athletic future in the bag for him until Kate spontaneously found a new partner to skate with and left Derek in the dust. Stiles is almost positive he could've beaten ass as a single skater as well, but Derek Hale certainly seems like the type to carry emotional baggage around with him and let it hinder his future endeavors.

Back when the guy fell from one of the best skaters in the country to a nobody living in a mansion at the edge of town, Stiles thought his downfall was kind of a shame.

Now that he's assigned to work with him, Stiles retracts that statement.

Derek Hale is obstinate, hard to work with, and even harder to fully comprehend. He makes Stiles feels about five times smaller even though they're the same height out of the sheer presence his jaw line demands and how broad his shoulders are, and standing in front of Stiles sizing up his rather unimpressive physique Derek looks like he'd rather be walking barefoot through a field of Legos rather than be here working with Stiles. What's super unfair about this entire ordeal is that Derek hasn't been skating nationally for years, but he's still in top shape and looks like he could bench press Stiles in his sleep. Next to him is Coach Finstock, rattling away like this partnership is love at first.

"You know what I love about this?" Finstock says gleefully, clapping both men on the back. "It's a win-win situation. Derek needs to get back in the swing of things after being a hermit in the middle of the woods like a psycho, and Stilinski needs something special to make his routine completely less totally boring."

Finstock says it all with a shit-eating grin like it's secretly a compliment. Stiles has been training with the guy long enough to know when to pick his battles, but Derek is looking at the guy like he'd very much like to stick his toe pick up Finstock's unmentionable place if he ever has the balls to call him a psycho again.

"Shouldn't we first see how things go between us?" Stiles ventures. He sneaks another look at Derek's face and his set jaw and his hands that could crush trash cans and wonders if this is really what his routine needs to spice it up. He could think of several other things, like skating with puppies or adding a little bling to his outfit. Johnny Weir did it all the time and Stiles doesn't have any dignity that prevents him from gluing a few rhinestones to his spandex one piece.

"Stilinski, this isn't a marriage," Finstock dismisses. "The judges are gonna eat you up when they hear Derek Hale is back in business. This is all about combining you guys into one unstoppable unit."

He grinds his hands together as if to imitate how they'll be working together in the next few weeks, and Stiles can't help but agree that the gnashing and the colliding is definitely accurate. And with that, before either of them have a say in things, Finstock turns on his heel and heads for his office, murmuring praises to his genius thinking all the while.

* * *

"I can't partner up with Derek Hale," is the first thing that comes out of Stiles' mouth when he sees Finstock again. He's handing Stiles a bottle of water that he swiftly pulls back into his own hands when he hears the words come out of Stiles' mouth.

"You mean you can't wait to partner up with Derek Hale."

"Coach, Derek Hale and I are nothing alike, okay?" Stiles grumbles. Finstock crosses his arms and squints at him like he's secretly shocked at Stiles' lack of enthusiasm about his idea to pair the two of them up together. "We'd cut out each other's throats before we create a routine that works."

"You're in luck, then, Stilinski. You're not the one creating the routines," Finstock points out, looking very much like he'd like to cuff Stiles over the back of the head right now. He takes a long swig from the water bottle that was supposed to be Stiles' post-training refreshment.

"C'mon, Coach, I _know_ I can make my routine more interesting without him. The judges are gonna take one look at his sour face and mark us down so much we'll never make it past regionals."

"If it's Derek's facial expressions you're worried about, Stilinski, why don't you use some of your class-A humor on him to lighten him up?" Finstock suggests. "Your jokes are so bad they always get me laughing."

"Ha, ha."

"Stilinski," Finstock interrupts before Stiles can rattle off more truly justifiable reasons as to why this is a bad idea. He puts a hand on Stiles shoulder and leans in earnestly. "Find a way to work with him before the frustration of being a figure skating coach encourages me to go on a murderous rampage. Go practice with him tomorrow, all right? Get a feel for his movement."

Finstock wiggles Stiles' arms a bit for him and raises his eyebrows, fully expecting acquiescence. When Stiles lets out a low, seriously incredulous breath of disappointment he takes it as compliance and claps Stiles' jovially—and perhaps a little roughly—on the shoulder.

"That's my boy."

* * *

"Isn't that—"

"Creepy recluse Derek Hale living alone in the house in the middle of the woods, yeah," Stiles says dryly as he sits in front of the television playing old tapes of Derek's performances. He'd found a few dusty tapes in the records at the skating club and a few videos on YouTube and ran with them, deciding that if he was going to even consider working with Derek he'd at least have to get a grasp of his process. On the television, fuzzy with time, Derek nails a Lutz jump, perfectly mirroring Kate Argent a few feet away from him in the rink. "Except with less stubble."

"I saw him at the gas pump the other day," Stiles' dad says as he settles into the couch next to Stiles with a beer in his hand, watching the television like he's witnessing a deer with no legs learn how to prance. Stiles isn't surprised. Seeing Derek Hale prowl around town every time he crawls out of his hole for groceries doesn't lead anybody to assumptions that he'd have the grace or flexibility to be a figure skater. "Always very grim. Is he getting back into skating?"

Stiles takes another deep grudging breath, his new default response to anybody mentioning Derek Hale being assigned to work with him. "He's my new partner."

"Partner?" His dad repeats incredulously. "You don't do pair skating."

"I do now," Stiles grumbles. On the screen, Derek's knee forms a flawless ninety-degree angle as he performs a lunge. His other leg curves behind his body like a pretzel. That kind of flexibility is a rare gift. "Finstock thinks my performances are too boring to get me any further than I got last year."

"And he thought this guy would help you tap into your artistic side?" His father points to the screen just as Derek, stony as ever, picks Kate up and twirls her effortlessly over his head. Her outfit, frilled with teal feathers, billows pleasantly in the breeze of their movements. They work together flawlessly, and Stiles briefly considers hurling over the couch at the idea of replacing Kate's shoes while Derek would gracefully lift him over his head. Yeah, no.

"He's a great skater, he's just… he looks so hard to work with. I don't even know where to start with the guy," Stiles says. "He clearly doesn't want to be working with me."

"What happened to this girl?" His dad points again just as Kate completes a Mohawk turn that Stiles wants to rewind at least three times just to memorize her precision.

"Not entirely sure," Stiles admits. "She's some big name Olympian now, though, while Derek's not exactly anywhere near that title, so it can't have been pretty."

* * *

Stiles is stretching over a balance beam the next time he sees Derek after a week of exercising in solitude and very narrowly avoiding Finstock and his repetitive e-mails demanding to know if he and Derek are eating lunch together yet, the sight of eight such e-mails in his inbox posing the question why he ever thought it to be a good idea to share methods of communication with his trainer. He's done a pretty good job mentally considering what it would be like to work with Derek Hale—he knows perfectly well that the guy's amazing on his skates and certainly didn't have trouble lifting Kate Argent around, he just has no idea how many casualties there will be along the way if the two of them have to work together.

He has to admit, pair skating isn't exactly his thing. He had to do it to get past testing, a compulsory examination to showcase that he could remain parallel and in unison with another skater. Back then it had been a pretty brunette who weighed not much more than a few feathers in his hand, and picking her up and twirling in sync with her was nearly effortless. Now he looks at Derek, two-hundred pounds of sheer muscle, and wonders how on earth he's supposed to be graceful with that hunk of flesh constantly in his personal space.

"You'd stretch better if you took a breath now and again," Derek says, suddenly next to him on the balance beam. He doesn't look like he'd be able to touch his own toes, but Derek props his ankle up onto the beam and hugs his own calf like a folding table slotting together. Stiles is not jealous and is most certainly not staring at the way Derek's exercise clothes cling to him. Every crevice of the guy is enunciated with defined muscle.

Stiles makes a show of exhaling, trying his hardest to make it ooze sarcasm. Derek cracks what looks to be an amused smirk as Stiles curls his fingers around his ankle.

"Finstock is crazy to think we could work together," Stiles mutters into his leg. His calf is burning but he'll be damned if he's about to appear winded in front of Derek, the guy who he saw do both a death spiral and a combination spin in under five minutes with minimal deductions on VHS last night.

"Agreed," Derek says, removing his leg from the beam. Stiles mirrors him and tries not to notice in his peripherals how nice they look in sync together in the mirror on the wall next to him. It was like teaming up brawn and charm. Stiles hates it when Finstock's right.

"Do you wanna try it out?" Stiles' mouth asks without permission.

"Honestly? No. Working with you is not exactly an upgrade for me," Stiles' mouth falls open, very much ready to give a strongly worded retort in response to Derek's ego when Derek stops him. "But I'll try."

And that's how Stiles signs his soul over to the devil.

* * *

"I am _liking_ what I'm seeing here."

Finstock is positively gleeful when they both show up to the rink the next day to get acquainted with each other's skating styles. Stiles has seen enough videos of this guy to know what he's comfortable with and what his approach to skating is—a little rigid, a little distant, and unbelievably nimble. Somehow all of his traits don't add up together, but they do, right up with the rest of his chromosomes to create the enigma that is the skating champion Derek Hale. Personally, Stiles could see that sort of grim face on wanted posters in his father's office at the police station much more than he can in a spandex suit, but life's funny that way. He doubts, however, that Derek's done the same amount of research on him, and Stiles may not have the same intimidating glare that Derek's eyes borrowed from a mafia member somewhere, but Derek has to be kidding himself if he thinks that Stiles is going to sacrifice all of his own stylistic skating choices in favor of Derek's.

They haven't even gotten on the ice yet, and Stiles' brain is already creating mental battles he's in full preparation for. It's the beginning of a beautiful love story.

"All right. I hope everybody's warmed up for what I have planned today," Finstock claps his hands together. He's grinning, which Stiles knows is a bad sign. "Because if every muscle you own doesn't ache after you leave here today, you're doing something wrong."

Stiles groans. He did one hundred squats yesterday just because he had the image of Derek's rock hard thighs etched in his brain and his legs still feel a bit like gelatin that stubbornly refuses to harden.

"I can handle that," Derek says next to him grimly, and goodness, now it's a challenge. Stiles imperceptibly straightens up while Finstock cackles with delight.

"We got ourselves a fighter!" He leaps forward to ruffle Derek's hair, which wipes any previously existing cocky smirk right off of Derek's face. When it comes to Finstock's antics, Stiles can definitely handle those much better than he can any of his suicide training sessions. He gives Derek a small cheeky smile over his shoulder which Derek makes no effort to return. "So I'm thinking that what we're going to do is create a routine that's going to punch all gender stereotypes right in the balls."

"What's the plan, coach?"

"He lifts you, you lift him, both of you twirl and lean and do everything the skirt-wearers and the lifters do, got it? From this point on, you're not _men_, you're _skaters_," Finstock stares them both hard in the eyes as if waiting for one of them to jump up and refuse. "Besides, you're both wearing spandex, you shouldn't feel that attached to your masculinity in the first place."

Derek rolls his eyes. Stiles seesaws back and forth on his skates, ready to get the first nightmare practice over with.

"Asses on the ice!" is the next thing Finstock yells, and Stiles salutes him before heading for the rink and circling it a few times to blow off that shot of espresso he had this morning. The breeze whips at his cheeks as he picks up speed, a calming coolness that makes him feel less like he's in for a never-ending day with his coach and his new partner.

The first thing Finstock has them do is twirl together until Stiles is dizzy. They grab each other's hands and just _move_, and that's already a disaster, which Stiles thinks is probably an omen everybody's ignoring. Finstock tells them to spin in unison and somehow Derek goes left and Stiles goes right and they end up like two mismatched spinning tops ready to fall off a tabletop until Finstock blows his whistle and they stop themselves.

They move from mirror skating to shadow skating, which works but definitely isn't wowing anybody. Stiles trails behind Derek and tries to keep their legs in rhythm, but the real struggle is trying to look anywhere but Derek's behind as his ass contracts and flexes with every push forward on the ice. God, if only he had been cocky and hideous, then Stiles wouldn't be suffering from this moral dilemma.

His ass is a little too distracting for Stiles' liking, actually, because just as Finstock blows his whistle and Derek obediently comes to a stop, Stiles continues barreling into him and promptly feels as if he's just rammed his forehead into a brick wall. Derek spins around and glares.

"Stilinski! Keep your head in the game!" Finstock hollers, tossing him and Derek both water bottles. "Ogle his ass on your own time!"

"I wasn't—!"

"Shut it!" Finstock cuts off what surely would've been a lovely diatribe of denial and stomps out onto the ice, hardly amused at the progress the two of them have been making. Stiles is inclined to blame Derek and the way he can't get the giant stick out of his ass. "Hale! Loosen up a little, will you? If a shot of tequila is what you need to get your spine to relax then I'm fine doing an episode of Drunkards on Ice."

Stiles can practically hear Derek grind his teeth together from their distance of a few feet. Finstock pulls out a crumpled list from his pocket.

"You guys see this? This is what I wanted to get done with you two hooligans today," Finstock trails his finger down the list. "We haven't even gotten to lifting yet. _Lifting_. There are third graders doing this stuff. If this is some kind of silly trust issue, you guys need to fix that stat. Go skydiving together. Eat at a vegan place. Do _something_."

"Yes, coach," Stiles murmurs dutifully. Somehow he doesn't think Derek will be up for the skydiving.

* * *

They start jogging together. Or rather, Stiles takes one for the team and has his father look up Derek's address so he can stalk the nearest jogging trail on Sunday mornings. It's remarkably easy after that, only taking one well-timed leap out of a bush where he was conveniently tying his shoe paired with an earnest "you jog here, too? What a small world!" for Derek to begrudgingly let Stiles join him on his jogging routine. Stiles learned back in junior high that jogging was about endurance over speed, but Derek sprints so fast it's like he's got Lucifer at his heels. Stiles keeps up.

"Y'know, there's this thing called isopraxism where people who spend a lot of time together start wearing the same clothes, making the same hand gestures," Stiles shares, only slightly breathlessly, as Derek swerves off the beaten path and Stiles follows.

"I can certainly give you a hand gesture if that's what you want."

"Humor, I like that. Very hard to find raw humor this early on a Sunday," Stiles chuckles dryly. "I'm just saying, maybe we could really make this whole thing work if we spent some time together."

"What's your definition of spending time together?"

"I don't know, we share a milkshake on the weekends and go jogging. We don't have to sign our souls over to each other."

"Good," Derek says, and leave it to Derek to focus on the one part of the sentence that didn't matter. Stiles rolls his eyes and considers tripping Derek just to slow him down, instead going for a simpler method and swerving in front of the guy. There's still a morning nip in the air that has Stiles' cheek pinched pink, but Derek has a thin layer of sweat tickling at his neck down to his shirt. Stiles doesn't focus on it.

"Dude, you have the upper hand here. You've been a pair skater before, I never have," Stiles tries to reason with the hunk of meat in front of him. Derek's chest heaves a little from the exertion of his running as he stares Stiles down. "As much as I hate to admit it, Finstock normally knows what he's doing and maybe he's right that we can make this work."

He gesticulates between the two of them. Derek follows his hand's movements with his eyes.

"I don't do milkshakes," Derek says, and Stiles briefly considers throwing himself into that thorny bush over there. "I'm more of a protein shake kind of guy."

His lips quirk upwards a tad like he's actually amused at how much effort Stiles is putting into getting Derek to spend an afternoon with him, and Stiles takes what he can and doesn't even think about going to customer service to complain even if Stiles thinks his ass could whip up a better beverage than a protein shake.

* * *

Considering that Derek agrees to spending time with Stiles, he sure fights tooth and nail when it comes to following through on that promise.

They do the whole protein shake thing—Stiles practically inhales his to get it over with and watches in incredulity as the barista behind the counter at the unbelievably pretentious health drink shop tries to flirt her way into Derek's heart of ice. Stiles knows nothing can penetrate that heart, not a free protein shake and certainly not a few smiles and twirling of a strand of hair by a petite blonde trying to make blending fruits as sexy as possible. Stiles spends his time making a swan out of a napkin over at the corner table while he waits for Derek to join him, only slightly amused when Derek throws the receipt Stiles watched the barista write her number on in the trash without a second glance.

"You know she was interested in you, right?" Stiles mumbles around his straw, sucking back a concoction of pineapple and octopus vomit. For seven bucks and a taste that could rival toxic waste, this drink better cause Stiles to grow wings or become the fucking Hulk.

"Yeah," Derek says like it was obvious, and it sort of was. Stiles snorts.

"And you weren't gonna do anything about it?" Stiles looks over his shoulder to where the barista keeps shooting discreet glances over at their table. He sends her a cheeky wave which abruptly causes her to get back to work. "Is blonde and tiny not your type?"

"Why don't we worry a little less about my love life and a little more about your over-rotations?"

"I—what? Over-rotations? Are you kidding me?"

"I saw it on all of your jumps," Derek says. "You should really check yourself."

Stiles stares in utter amazement. If there's anything he can nail, it's his jumps. He hasn't popped a Lutz in over three years and he knows exactly how to tuck his feet in to gain all the momentum he needs.

"Did anybody ever tell you that you're kind of an asshole?" Derek shrugs, smirking, and Stiles leans forward to grab Derek's cup and toss it into the trashcan. It was still pretty full, and hearing it _thunk_ on the bottom of the trashcan is oddly satisfying. Derek's smirk vanishes as Stiles gets up and cocks his head to the door. "C'mon."

"What are you doing?'

"We're gonna go find something that you suck at so I can laugh at you," Stiles says, throwing his own beverage away into the bin and heading for the door. In the reflection of the glass, he can see Derek grumbling to collect his stuff but starts following him anyway. "Are you any good at bowling?"

* * *

Derek isn't good at bowling. It's the best day of Stiles' life.

* * *

It's rather unfortunate, but the constant touching and lifting isn't exactly helping Stiles' little problem.

To be honest, it's not _his_ problem, exactly, but rather little Stiles' problem. He noticed the first time he met Derek that the guy was hard all over and had thighs that could bench press a pick-up truck all on their lonesome. His eyes are a little addictive and his hands are broad and warm, pleasant patches of heat each time he latches them onto Stiles' waist and lifts him.

A part of him, the reasonable part, thinks that all pair skating routines are like this—close, intimate, and completely devoid of personal bubbles, but the hormonally frustrated part of himself that can do nothing much but jerk off in the showers after he gets out of his training clothes and all but throws his skates across the room is positive that Finstock has made this the most sexually charged routine in the world just to spice things up. If his ultimate goal is to set Stiles' loins on fire and turn this into a circus stunt show then yes, maybe they'll have sectionals in the bag.

"Coach, do they have to be parallel spread eagles?" Stiles mumbles, not exactly sure that a position that puts his crotch at a great vantage point to start some dry humping with Derek out on the ice is a good idea. Finstock gives no pause for his pain, patting him on the back as he downs the rest of his water bottle and practically shoving him out into the center.

"It looks great, Stilinski," Finstock assures him, clapping his hands a few times to get his energy rolling. Stiles takes a deep breath and skates up to where Derek is waiting for him, having inhaled his water bottle two minutes ago. There's a smell in the air like freshly washed clothes that Stiles is positive is Derek's aftershave, a scent his nose only picks up on when he's standing decidedly too close.

He puts his hands on Derek's hips, meets his intense gaze, aligns his heels, and does the spread eagle without acting on his urge to drop to his knees right there. Stiles takes it as his personal victory of the day.

* * *

He didn't want to do it, but Stiles lets Derek help him with his jumps.

Turns out, he's over-rotating.

"You know, if I'm gonna let you help me with my jumps, you should at least let me help you with your Salchow," Stiles offers after he lands exactly where he needs to on one of his toe-loop jumps and does a few victory twirls on the spot. It brings him back to when he was fifteen and landed his first Axel semi-correctly and had Scott cheering for him in the empty stands. It really wasn't all that impressive at the time, but Scott's easily impressed.

"There's nothing wrong with my Salchow," Derek says firmly.

"So how about we skip the part where your pride keeps you from admitting I'm right?" Stiles suggests. He's grown immune to Derek's glare by now and just barrels on. "Your timing's off. And you're not snapping into your backspin position either, not to mention that you keep your arms stiff for too long."

"Anything else?" Derek grits out, and Stiles whistles because the guy clearly isn't great at taking constructive criticism.

"I'm just trying to help, Grumpy."

"I look nothing like a dwarf."

"Whatever you say," Stiles holds his hands up in defense and skates over to where Derek is leaning against the wall observing Stiles' rotations with the eyes of a hawk. He holds out his hand. "Don't leave me high and dry. C'mon, I'm helping you."

Derek gives, but he doesn't grab Stiles' hand, clearly still much too protective of his pride to let Stiles drag him on the ice like this is a junior high schoolers' first date. They skate into the center where Stiles sidles up next to Derek and tucks his arms into his chest.

"You start the Salchow with your arms still, right?" Stiles says, and Derek nods slowly. "You gotta end it by scooping upwards or you won't get enough lift. Try it."

He skates backward and waits, watching as Derek takes a breath and takes off, curving off into a jump. It's almost perfect. Amazingly enough, he takes Stiles' advice, which is already enough of a miracle for Stiles to send a prayer to the man above.

"Better, right?"

Derek looks remarkably perplexed, like the idea of Stiles knowing what he's doing is a new concept for him. "Yeah."

"Don't look so surprised," Stiles says dryly, skating up to Derek again. "I'm actually pretty good."

"I know you are," Derek says, very quietly, so quietly Stiles almost doesn't hear it, and it's enough to turn his double Axel into a triple when he jumps into it ten minutes later.

* * *

The routine is perfect, except for the lifts.

Yes, there's a few snafus where Derek can't put anything on his face but a frown and some of their movements are a little stiff when they aren't on opposite ends of the rink, but they mirror each other almost flawlessly. Stiles isn't sure if his factoid about isopraxism is at work here, but he certainly feels that watching Derek spoon the foam off his coffee is giving him a better sense of who the hell he's even working with. He knows Derek the figure skater—he's seen him on television, read about him in the news. Derek Hale the person, however, is a harder egg to crack.

"Jesus Christ, Derek, just let me grab your hips!"

"Stiles, I swear to _God_—"

Stiles lets loose a string of curse words as he leans in to grab Derek by the hips and lift him, only to be once again denied as Derek swiftly glides backward. He has this unreadable look on his face like he's both terrified and one hundred percent guarded, and Stiles definitely takes that offensively considering that Stiles has been bench pressing more than his weight preparing for moments like this when he's the one with the responsibility of throwing Derek in the air. He takes a deep breath and counts slowly to three in his head to keep from jamming the blade on the bottom of his right skate into Derek's shin.

"Dude, we can't do the twist lift if you don't even let me _touch_ you," Stiles puts on his best annoyed face and purses his lips. Derek stares at him like he's waiting for Stiles to implode out of the sheer will of his own mental powers, but Stiles stands his ground and glowers directly back into his eyes. It's a little frustrating, because Derek's eyes are a mixture of green and blue and a little bit of gold and they're the sort of eyes that Stiles hates staring at because they're easy to get lost in. He still doesn't let himself surrender to the staring contest as loser, though.

"Fine," Derek grits out, and gets up in Stiles' space so he can grab him by the hips and heave him up.

He's heavy, but Stiles hasn't been weight lifting for nothing. He takes a breath and holds him up, by the hips, testing his weight in his palms, and Derek looks like he might be constipated.

"Calm the hell down and _relax_," Stiles says.

"I don't trust you enough to do this," Derek grits out, and Stiles feels something in his stomach plummet. He knows that the basis of pair skating is trust, forming a bond that maybe doesn't translate into friendship or late nights staying up playing video games together or going out for pizza, but it _has_ to include trust. Stiles feels it right in his gut, because he'd trust Derek to fucking lasso him over his head.

"_What_?"

"You don't trust me. I don't trust you," Derek says between his teeth. "But you need me to win sectionals, which is why you're not letting me go."

_Needs him to win sectionals_. Stiles feels like screaming.

So he lets Derek go. Actually, he _hurls_ him onto the floor.

Derek hits the ground with an almost sickening thud, skidding on the ice and living scars where his blade digs into the ground and slashes. Finstock comes running out onto the rink with street shoes hollering all the while, bending over Derek and almost forgetting to roar at Stiles in the meantime.

"Stilinski! What the hell is your problem?!"

Stiles looks down at where Derek is almost gingerly sitting up while Finstock looms over him and fixes eyes that could kill on Stiles like Stiles has just ruined his chance of becoming a world renowned coach with one poorly-timed moment of rebellion. There's no blood, which makes Stiles feel better, but somehow he hopes there's going to be one hell of a bruise, and that's a thought that makes him stomp off the ice right then.

* * *

Stiles sits at home watching _Ice Princess_ for a few days before he considers going to see Derek. He knows it's a bad idea to talk to him before he can genuinely give him an apology, and right now, with Derek's _you need me to win_ echoing in his head, he's still positive he's the one who deserves the apology.

A part of him wonders if this is why Kate left, because Derek was so unbelievably stubborn and was too emotionally constipated to contribute any trust into their skating relationship, but another knows that his partner leaving him probably had nothing to do with Derek at all. It's the curiosity of the story that actually has him putting on his shoes and seeking Derek out and finally succumbing to Finstock's endless text messages ranging from "the last time I threw my partner over my head I spent one hundred bucks on edible arrangements" and "talk to your partner or you might wake up without knee caps."

He finds Derek in the weights room down the hall from the rink, which is stupid, because from the memory in his head of the way Derek's body sounded when he hit the ice, he shouldn't be exerting himself just yet. Stiles still isn't sure if he values Derek's perseverance or loathes his lack of self-worth.

"Should you really be doing that already?" Stiles asks from the doorway. Derek doesn't stop his exercising, continuing to pull himself up on the pull-up bar on the ceiling. His shirt is drenched with sweat and Stiles' eyes concentrate on the smattering of leg hair on his calf where his shorts cut off before he takes another step in and offers Derek a cup of iced water he had originally poured for himself at the water cooler.

"Why are you here, Stiles?" Derek grits out in between another pull-up. Stiles sighs.

"Look, I'm sorry for dropping you," he admits, "Did you bruise?"

Derek scoffs under his breath and drops from the bar, fixing Stiles with a glower before he hitches up his shirt to reveal a mottled purple bruise trailing up his side. Stiles winces and reaches out to ghost his fingertips over the shades of blue, but Derek steps back before he can find contact.

"I'm fine," Derek dismisses, reaching for the bar again. Stiles pushes him back before he can reach it and they engage in a brief glowering match before either of them speak again.

"Dude, you know why I dropped you, don't you?" Stiles asks. Derek doesn't nod or shake his head, only a slight twitch in his jaw giving any indication that he had heard Stiles at all. "I was proving a point. Badly, yeah, but I did. You said you didn't trust me, and you _should_ trust me."

"And you thought throwing me on the ground would prove this point?" Derek sums up, hardly amused.

"Like I said, it was bad. But—dude, I trust you, all right?" Stiles sighs. He holds out the water, condensating in his hand, and this time Derek takes it, downing its contents in one gulp. "Is this about everything with Kate?"

Derek's features harden like someone's just told him they've found his diary and posted it on the Internet, especially the parts that betray the secret that he actually has _feelings_.

"Stiles, don't pretend you know anything about that."

"Exactly, I _don't_!" Stiles grabs onto Derek's shoulders and tries to level with him man to man. "Look, I already said I was sorry for what I did, now can we move on and actually start trusting each other?"

Derek's eyes flit down to where Stiles' hands are squeezing his shoulders and further still to where his mottled bruise is sitting underneath his shirt. For a second, he looks like he's very much ready to say no and abandon their whole partnership because the idea of fully trusting another individual is scarier than slipping bleach into his morning orange juice, but then he gives a tight little nod and leans into Stiles' hands on his shoulders.

For a second they look at each other and it seems as if Derek is on the verge of an actual apology, unblinking eyes locked on Stiles', but then his eyes flicker down to Stiles' lips. Stiles unconsciously licks them and finds himself nudging forward just the slightest of centimeters as if to signal a green, but then Derek is shuffling out from underneath Stiles' hands and heading for the showers.

Stiles has no idea what the fuck just happened.

* * *

"Dance class?" Stiles parrots dumbly. Vigorously, Finstock nods. "This is supposed to help?"

"This is a great idea, Stilinski," Finstock emphasizes, "Ever since your little Tonya Harding stunt, I've been getting the feeling that the two of you need to connect off the ice."

"Didn't think you'd pick up on that, coach."

"Just a couple lessons. It'll improve your rhythm anyway," Finstock gives Stiles a pointed look, like rhythm is definitely something he should be looking to improve without any objections.

Stiles decides not to argue. Derek can take this one.

However, he realizes the next day when he's sitting against the wall of tango class watching a delicate woman in a fiery red dress demonstrate a dance that's somehow both aggressively erotic and tenderly romantic, the only thing completing the picture being a rose stuck between her partner's teeth, that Derek apparently didn't have any objections either, who slides in five minutes late and sits down next to Stiles.

"I thought you'd say no to Finstock for sure," Stiles stage-whispers to him over the sound of the tango music.

"He has a point," Derek confesses, and shucks off his jacket just in time for the students to waltz out onto the floor and give the first few basic moves a try. Stiles is too baffled that Derek even showed up to berate him for being late, heading for the dance floor and grabbing Derek's waist. "You're gonna be the man?"

"We're not _men_ anymore, remember?" Stiles grins, "We're _skaters_. And you can be the guy next dance."

Oddly enough, Derek doesn't object and places his hands squarely on Stiles' shoulders. They're still a polite distance apart, a gap that very swiftly dwindles away with the help of the roaming instructor, who promptly nudges them together. He's wearing leg warmers and a rather lewd smile as he leans into their personal space.

"Remember, boys, the tango is a dance of passion," he points out helpfully before smoothly gliding past t hem and leaping onto the next awkward couple. Stiles sneaks a glance at Derek, who's looking directly at Stiles like he's just figured something out.

"You've been working out," Derek says, and Stiles nods slowly.

"Yeah, with competition season coming up and everything. How'd you know?"

Derek shrugs and bumps into his chest, their proximity making it less than difficult for Stiles to map out every single muscle in Derek's chest pressed again his own. It's certainly not the worst situation in the world to be caught in, but Stiles could think of plenty more where he'd feel more comfortable. On the ice, it's simple. Two sharp blades and an expanse of frozen land waiting to be skidded and marked upon. Even with Derek on the ice with him, it's simple. But here on land, with the slippery dance floor beneath him and the tips of Derek's shoes bumping into his, his body feels alien and clumsy. Derek's palm, wrapped around his, squeezes.

"Stiles, it isn't dancing if you aren't moving at all," Derek mentions, knocking their knees together to inspire movement in Stiles. Stiles gets with the program and tries to recreate the pattern of steps the instructor had performed at least three times when he was sitting against the wall daydreaming about pizza. He hasn't had pizza with Scott at three a.m. since training season began, and he's pretty sure Finstock would be able to smell the pepperoni on his breath even if he rinsed with mouthwash more than once.

The pattern, as it turns out, isn't as simple as the lady had made it seem, which is silly, because Stiles can memorize an entire long program and knows all the steps his body has to follow in order to launch and land a perfect double Axel, but here he is struggling with a few shifts of the feet. He realizes then, and he's pretty sure Derek does too, exactly how out of touch they are with each other's bodies. Yes, they skate side-by-side and hoist each other into the air, but they don't really think about each other while doing it. It's all protocol, all textbook, all things they've seen on television. It's the deep-seated connection that's really missing.

"I think I should tell you about Kate," Derek murmurs, so quietly Stiles has to lean in just to catch his words. He's talking to shoes like it's taking all of his concentration to watch his footwork and not step on Stiles' feet, and Stiles lets him avoid eye contact if it's what he needs to get this story out.

"You—you don't have to," Stiles feels obliged to assure him, but Derek shakes his head and moves faster, a little aggressively, so Stiles is nearly swung into the wall. They're not really doing the tango, not at all, and over his shoulder Stiles sees a couple who have the moves down so well the girl is wrapping her leg around her partner's waist and pirouetting off his thigh.

"We skated together for a long time," Derek begins. "And I was half in love with her. She was older, graceful, mature, and she spun on the ice in ways that I had never seen anybody spin before, and she taught me nearly everything she knew."

An instructor snaps at them to keep moving. Stiles keeps up a slightly unsteady turn of his feet to keep them mobile that Derek goes along with.

"We won the Olympics and then she left," Derek pauses, and there's a little shake to his neck that Stiles knows by now is poorly veiled anger. "She needed something to get her noticed, and I was convenient. She found herself a new partner and took off without another word."

There's silence in which Stiles hears nothing but the soft tango music wafting over from the speakers pinned on the wall. For a moment he doesn't know what to say, pressed up close against Derek and listening to him wait for a response, and then it hits him.

"You know what, coach is full of it," Stiles mumbles, and Derek looks up at him. "I have a much better idea to improve our rhythm."

* * *

Stiles decides then and there while listening to Derek's story that a few stiff twirls in a dusty dance studio is not going to help Derek trust him when he's shouldering the history of a partner who abandoned him without a second glance, and comes up on the spot with an alternative activity that he knows won't fail.

Two hours later when he and Derek are camped out in his cramped apartment battling each other in Wii Tennis, Stiles congratulates himself on his random spurts of genius.

They've been to the smoothie place and gone jogging at the crack of dawn, but letting him into his personal life and letting him step into the poorly decorated hole he calls his home is definitely a step into building an actual relationship with Derek Hale. There's no place to hide here, a cluttered mess of a lumpy couch and a few time-bleached pictures of Stiles propped up on his mother's knee on the wall, where none of Stiles' idiosyncrasies and dirty socks can duck out of sight from Derek's eyes. It's a place that's one hundred percent unfiltered Stiles, and if seeing Stiles' filthy laundry littered under the couch isn't a sign of trust, Stiles isn't quite sure what to do next.

It works, though, for the most part. It turns out that Derek is a competitive little bastard who likes to cheat, from pointing out the window when the ball comes his way and prodding Stiles' tickle spot in his midsection, a spot which Stiles guards like his most coveted possession that he had no idea Derek knew about. He had seen this part of him when they had been bowling, except then it had been intermingled with the stench of sore losing and the grumpiness of direly wishing he could be somewhere else being productive, and this time Derek is putting his all into his animated tennis racket and showing no signs of surrender.

They play two rounds before Stiles gets tired of looking at Derek's automated Mii, an old man with a mustache, and suggests that Derek make his own, which turns out to take much longer than the expected five minutes. They fight over how much stubble Derek has and how tall Derek actually is when Derek tries to stretch his Mii up to fill up half the television, and when they finally agree on Derek's appearance and click Finish, it's dinnertime, and they pig out on beer and Chinese takeout under the sworn oath to never tell Finstock they've deviated from their strict pre-competition diet.

It almost feels like Stiles is back in college with Scott, every night full of questionable fast food and video games, except Derek's here instead, sticking his head into his pantry like he has every right to raid Stiles' snack drawer and beating his ass in Wii Golfing when Stiles' starts moaning about Wii Tennis elbow. For a guy whose only smiles around Stiles were consisted of sarcasm and smugness, the sight of a real life grin because Stiles is worse than a third grader at Wii Sports is the kind of thing Stiles wants to take a picture of to look back on later just to make sure it actually happened.

"Careful, there's some wind," Stiles murmurs around his second beer. He's not sure why he's helping his competition, especially when he's currently at double bogey with his own golf score, but Derek murmurs his gratitude and adjusts his golf club. He's so intensely focused it's almost endearing.

His golf ball goes swerving into the air and skips over the hole. The audience _oooo_s and _aaaaa_s appropriately. Stiles claps from where he's draped over the couch while Derek looks ready to claw his way into the screen.

"Priceless," Stiles mumbles into his beer bottle, which Derek promptly snatches out from under him to take a long swig. "Hey! Get your own!"

"It's much more satisfying to steal yours."

Stiles manhandles himself off the couch and blinks away the slightly tipsy blur to his eyes as he poises his remote. He's so far off the green he's pretty sure he's not even on the course anymore, but as it turns out he's only gotten himself lodged into the sand. He swings with all his might and lands two feet ahead. Derek chuckles.

"For somebody so great on the ice, you really can't hold your own in any other sports."

Stiles has a great retort on his lips that rapidly dies a premature death when he spins around and sees Derek's mouth wrapped around the beer bottle in a way that shouldn't be as distracting to Stiles as it is. It'd be an unfair distraction technique if Stiles thought that Derek was fully aware of what his mouth was doing to Stiles' brain cells.

He thinks about making a move on Derek after he grabs his fourth beer and is sprawled onto his armchair getting a nice view of Derek's ass while he makes par on the last course, but before he can even consider how he's going to approach the subject, he passes out on the couch well past midnight and wakes up to an empty apartment with a cable-knit throw tucked around his waist.

* * *

**_Derek (10:27pm):_** you should come meet me at the rink

**_Stiles(10:29pm):_** it's locked by now you know

**_Derek(10:30pm):_** not a problem considering I have the keys

**_Stiles(10:33pm):_** you stole that off of coach didn't you

**_Derek(10:36pm):_** we should work on our pancake spins

**_Stiles(10:40pm):_** only if we get pancakes afterward

**_Derek(10:41pm):_** done

* * *

Stiles doesn't know why he thought it was a good idea to drive out to a skating rink he and Derek are illegally breaking into with the help of Derek's thievery like Stiles is secretly back in high school when it's pitch black outside and Stiles' piece of crap Jeep is barely climbing up the road to get there in the first place. He had been close to falling into a deep slumber on the coziest spot on the couch when his phone had buzzed in his pocket, and the combination of Derek and pancakes after ten at night was too tempting of a bargain to pass up.

When he pulls into the dim parking lot he sees a figure in the shadows by the door, a frame he knows all too well as Derek's bulky shouldered one. When Derek turned into a rebel keen on breaking the rules for the hell of it, Stiles isn't sure, but he's not going to question what is definitely about to be a thrilling night simply because Finstock won't be breathing down his neck telling him to jump higher and use his toe pick properly.

"Hi," Stiles breathes into the cold when he jogs up to the door. Derek smirks and holds up a ring of keys that most definitely came out of Finstock's possession. His grin is positively illegal.

"You in?" Derek asks, key poised in the lock.

"Uh, _hell yes_," Stiles answers back instantly, slipping inside after Derek to flick on the lights and take in the glow of solitude the rink contains when it's nearly empty. There's normally always somebody there—a trainer in an office studying footage, a coach obsessing over competition schedules, a few athletes stretching in the weight room or a skater fumbling about in a locker. Right now, the place is practically ringing with an undisturbed silence as the door shuts behind them, and yes, this is definitely better than watching reruns of _Friends_ while he texts Scott into the night.

They pull on their skates and tie them up side by side on the bench before Derek slides onto the rink and turns around, glancing at Stiles like he's challenging him to come and get him, a look so daring that Stiles can do little but run out there after him. He skates after him and watches as Derek speeds up, grazing the rim of the rink, while Stiles furiously chases him. It feels like a new side of Derek's been uncovered, the side that isn't hiding behind his history, the side that concentrates with all his might on video games and wants to play tag out on the ice in the middle of the night. Stiles feels like he's absolutely in love with that side, and the realization hits him like a brick.

Actually, it hits him in his face too, because he's so busy thinking about Derek Hale possibly starting to trust him and why on earth that's such a turn on to him to think about _where_ he's going, and he promptly smacks into the wall like this is actually his first time out on the ice, all bumbling feet and nervous shaking in the legs, and his back hits the ice with a thump.

Stiles blinks out the birds from his eyes before the roof of the rink comes into view, and right after that, Derek's face looming over him. His skates skid to a stop right before they collide into Stiles and oddly enough, Stiles feels no danger even as the sharpness of his toe pick grazes Stiles' shoulder. He smiles, probably a little dopily, and flashes Derek a quick thumbs up.

"What just happened?" Derek demands while Stiles rubs at where his forehead hit the glass. Very graceful, really. He would rank himself a nine out of ten.

"I got a little distracted," Stiles says, "and then landed on my ass."

And then he reaches for Derek's face, firmly cups his cheeks, and drags him down to meet his lips. The kiss lasts about three seconds, three blissful seconds where their mouths are mashed together and Stiles commits all of it to memory, and then it's over.

"How hard did you hit your head?" Derek asks skeptically when Stiles lets go of his face, staring down at Stiles like he's never seen anything quite like him before, and Stiles decides to give into the urge to kiss the expression off his face.

"Very hard, obviously, if I want to make out with your mug," Stiles says without missing a beat, pulling him down again.

It's smoother this time, and Derek actually seems into it, something Stiles is definitely investigating later. Stiles swipes his tongue over his lips and Derek settles onto his hips and for a few minutes Stiles doesn't even mind that the ice underneath him is freezing and slowly seeping into the warmth of his hoodie, too focused on the slide of Derek's lips against his. The guy can kiss as well as he can skate, slowly and elegantly, the kind of kisses that leave Stiles breathless and entranced until he needs to come up for air.

"Derek," Stiles mumbles on his lips. Derek barely _mmm_s as an acknowledgement that he's heard Stiles and heads for his neck, leaving a trail of open-mouthed kisses down to his collarbone while Stiles fists his shirt and collects his thoughts. "I'm getting hypothermia."

Derek grins on his neck and Stiles shoves at him, getting to his feet and pulling Derek up after him. They have That Moment where they both take in each other's swollen lips and process what just went down, Stiles feeling a blush creep up his ears while Derek smirks, all too satisfied with himself.

"This was your plan, wasn't it?" Stiles asks, brushing the flakes of ice off his front from when he had crashed into the wall and felt all the air being knocked out of his lungs with one strong landing. "Bring me here late into the night and seduce me."

"Not really," Derek says, and then he grabs Stiles' hand and pulls him along like an instructor teaching a toddler how to stay afloat on skates. "But I could be persuaded."

Stiles stares down at their fingers, threaded together, as Derek makes a languorous round around the rink. "What's with the hand holding?"

"Just in case you fall again," Derek murmurs to no one in particular, and Stiles knows he's smiling.

* * *

The holding hands while skating around the ice rink is all very adorable and _High School Musical_-esque minus the sudden harmonizing a song about living life to the fullest, but it's the part afterward that Stiles really wants to focus on.

After a few twirls around the rink without a single toe loop jump or Finstock roaring from the sidelines about tucking in arms and legs the right way, Derek tugs him to the exit, a freshness and urgency in his step that means he's thinking of exactly the same thing as Stiles.

The next few moments are a blur for Stiles, like someone thumped him over the head or he merely repressed the memory as unnecessary, because all he recalls next is Derek shucking off his skates with Stiles in tow and then pushing him against the bench with the rush of a man who knows what sexual frustration is.

The bench is cold, almost as cold as the ice, but Stiles isn't protesting. He's pretty sure they should be talking about how this might affect their partnership or if Derek's been thinking about this as long as Stiles has been ogling Derek's ass during practice, but the words seem like completely superfluous options that are rapidly losing out to the preferred alternative: making out like teenagers in the middle of the locker room.

The most embarrassing part is probably that Stiles feels himself hit half-mast almost the moment Derek blankets his body with his own, a line of defined muscle caging him in and waking his erection up from its blissfully dormant slumber, Derek's small roll of the hips doing nothing to quell his enthusiasm. This part _definitely_ doesn't feel like _High School Musical_ anymore, Derek's tongue much too present for a children's movie, brushing up against his and teeth nipping at his lower lip before he focuses on the expanse of Stiles' throat and gets to work sucking a very noticeable hickey onto his neck.

"Not too fast for you?" Stiles manages to say, already feeling a little breathless.

"Long overdue, in my opinion," Derek murmurs against his skin, a scrape of teeth suddenly entering the equation, and his voice has reached the perfect rumbling, husky tone that comes with arousal that makes Stiles want to start undressing every bit of Derek's clothing he can fist in his hands.

The bench is too narrow, not exactly the ideal surface for second base, but Stiles doesn't even think about suggesting relocating themselves to a more preferable location when he feels Derek's cock, just as interested as Stiles', bump his hip through his pants. Stiles scrabbles for purchase on the fabric of Derek's shirt and kisses what skin he can find, mouthing up his jaw and leaving teasing bites on Derek's ear that Derek responds to with full-body shudders. He has no idea how this escalated so quickly, from a late-night trip to the ice rink to grinding against Derek in the locker room, hands finally roaming over all the body parts he's only ogled from afar up till now.

Stiles palms his ass, the same ass he's been staring at for months, and feels the warm line of Derek's body press up against his and send electricity through every inch of skin on his body. This isn't the fumbling hook-ups he had in college; this is urgent, messy, and hotter than anything Stiles has ever experienced before. It's been months since he's felt a touch other than his own hand, and Derek's touches, ministrations so arousing they should be illegal, are bringing him to the brink embarrassingly fast. Derek's hand worms its way between their bodies, pushing Stiles' hoodie up and fumbling with the waistband of his pants. Stiles feels his heartbeat pick up, a rapid tattoo beating against his neck as he hastens to have his own hands slither south and grip Derek through his pants.

The noises, the positively sinful noises that Derek makes in response to all of Stiles' jerky touches are the type of breathy sounds that Stiles wants to commit to memory forever. A part of him, the part very much conflicting with the part that's looking to get off as fast as possible, wants to stretch Derek out on the bench and take his time, lick and suck on every bit of exposed skin and turn Derek into a vulnerable, writhing mess just to give him the filthiest blowjob of Stiles' life and put him out of his misery. He's pretty sure the sight would be enough masturbatory aid for centuries.

But he reels himself in from the dizzying thought and focuses on the task at hand, which is memorizing the feel of Derek's erect length press into his hands through his pants and trying his hardest to set a new record at removing clothes. He manages to throw Derek's shirt over his head so fast the fabric is just a blur of color to his eyes before it's abandoned to his floor, his own shirt following immediately after, even though it's the pants he's truly got his eyes on. He's momentarily distracted, though, by the sight of Derek's chest, every hour spent training paying off when Stiles' zeroes in on the way his chest is heaving with arousal and his stomach curves into the lines of defined abs. He feels a thrill of pride run through his bones at the thought of being one of the few people who has the privilege to touch Derek, skin-on-skin and as much as he wants, and briefly wonders if Kate Argent ever had the same privilege. The jealousy, however, is short-lived, as Derek yanks Stiles' pants and boxers off with a particularly aggressive tug of his hands and a frustrated growl, and with that Derek's mouth is on his dick with absolutely no warning.

Stiles definitely could've used a warning, like a flashing neon sign or a little tap to the shoulder, because he's not sure his body's prepared for the sudden warm, wet heat that Derek's tongue wrapped around the head of his cock is providing. His mouth drops open and his eyes flutter shut, hands clawing at the air helplessly before they settle on Derek's hair and scrape appreciatively at his scalp, Derek taking the ministrations as encouragement to take Stiles' erection deeper. Stiles is not protesting.

It does suck a little, though, that Derek is good at absolutely everything, from Wii Golfing to ice skating to giving blowjobs.

Stiles isn't one to take without giving, so he pushes Derek off with the sort of restraint that should be given a gold medal before he blows his load right there, shoving Derek back onto the bench the minute he watches his lips slip from Stiles' dick, all shiny and wet and abused, and pulls off Derek's very unnecessary pants. He practically chucks them at the lockers in his haste to get his mouth on Derek's dick, and if it's at all as promising as it felt in his hand, he knows his mouth isn't going to be disappointed. Derek looks at him ducked between his legs, swears breathlessly at the ceiling and tips his head back like he's ready to be torn apart with Stiles' mouth, and his confidence in Stiles' skills is oddly gratifying to Stiles as he licks his lips and takes Derek's cock into his mouth.

The response is instantaneous. Derek's whole body replies to Stiles' touches in a silent conversation that only their bodies are sharing, a subtle gasp and shiver that Stiles eagerly drinks up as he hollows his cheeks and sucks. It's not his first blowjob—he's had the odd sleazy encounter now and again and he had his unbelievably predictable experimentation phase just like everybody else a few years ago, enough experience to teach him to watch his teeth and how to handle his gag reflex. He gathers all he ever learned about the art of dick sucking and combines his efforts into what he hopes is the filthiest blowjob in the world, hands braced on Derek's thighs and tongue pressed flat against the underside of his length.

"Stiles," Derek murmurs breathlessly, and his voice sounds dazed and far away. Stiles pulls away from Derek's cock with a parting lick to glance at him from in between his legs. The sight apparently isn't helping Derek's self-control, and he reaches out to thread fingers between the short strands of Stiles' hair and pull him forward, and suddenly they're both sitting up with Derek guiding Stiles' hand to his cock while he steadily pumps Stiles', his mouth on his neck and short-circuiting all of his coherent thoughts.

He's sitting here at a skating rink in the middle of the night, naked except for his socks, still rolled up to his ankles, jerking off a guy who's panting into his neck and doing a lethal thing with his wrist while he works Stiles' erection in a way that's bringing forth his incoming orgasm much faster than he would've liked. He hopes, really squeezes his eyes shut and hopes, that this is going to happen again, that Stiles will have another opportunity to spread Derek out in front of him and lick whatever he pleases, in the daylight, in the nighttime, on his kitchen table, in Finstock's office.

"Aah, Derek—close," is all Stiles can offer as a warning, squeezing Derek's cock and thumbing the head while Derek tips their mouths together and kisses him as encouragement, bumping their noses together as he nods in a way that Stiles thinks means _me too_. He lets himself block out all the feelings that aren't Derek's hand stroking him to a steady rhythm and his own hand pumping the hot flesh of Derek's erection, forehead against Derek's as he comes with a cry.

Derek kisses him through it, joining Stiles' hand on his own dick and wrapping their fingers together, speeding up Stiles' tempo and coming a few seconds after him while Stiles is still riding the waves of his own sticky euphoria. In that moment, there's no place he'd rather be, completely content to be burrowed against Derek's chest even as come starts cooling on their stomachs and thighs.

"So," Stiles says breathlessly from where he's pillowed his head on Derek's shoulder, rising and falling with the heave of Derek's chest. "Pancakes now?"

Next to him, Derek huffs out what could be a chuckle. Stiles' hand trails down to the sharp, exposed line of his hipbone, committing the feeling of his skin to his memory while Derek's hand ghosts up and down his back. Stiles direly hopes nobody decides to join them at the rink right about now, even if it's unlikely to happen in the middle of the night, and it has nothing to do with a fear of rule breaking.

"No," Derek dismisses, and visions of fluffy batter and syrup are cruelly yanked from his brain. "My place first. Then pancakes in the morning."

Ah. Stiles can deal with delaying the pancakes a bit.

* * *

They stumble around the locker room looking for their clothing before they drive to Derek's apartment, a drive which definitely felt like the longest of Stiles' life, which Stiles only saw through the dark because Derek was a little busy ravishing his neck against the door to bother with the light switches. He made out a couch, a dining room table, and the bedroom door through the shadows before he blocked out all sensations that weren't the feeling of Derek's tongue licking a stripe up his jugular, and then he remembers a staggering walk to Derek's bed that ended with Stiles toppling onto the bed with Derek in close pursuit, a slew of movements that ultimately ended in a few handjobs.

The next morning, Stiles wakes up with Derek's chest pressed warm and firm against his back and his knees tucked securely against Stiles', snoring into his shoulder and dead to the world. Then they wake up, Derek endearingly grumpy before his first cup of coffee, and Derek seals his promise to go get pancakes.

It's not the worst day in the world.

* * *

"I don't know what kind of witchcraft you two had to work and what demons you had to summon to make your routine glow like this," Finstock yells in awe from the sidelines as Derek and Stiles land their final poses with ease. "But keep it up!"

He looks impressed enough to throw his clipboard in the air and kiss them both on the lips, but he holds it back and settles for a few enthusiastic claps instead. Derek snorts, his hand settling on the curve of the small of Stiles' back, a private touch away from Finstock's eyes, and Stiles knows exactly what witchcraft they pulled: having sex.

He never would've supposed that a few rounds of naked tumbling with Derek Hale would've been the place his life ended up taking him five years ago when he was still a bumbling kid struggling to land his Lutz, and here he is now, a pair skater with a damn good routine that, if his future telling skills are at all up to par, are going to win him sectionals.

* * *

The day of sectionals, Stiles wakes up feeling the familiar thrum of adrenaline and competition running through his blood, causing him to shoot up in bed like a jack in the box that's been wound up to bursting point. His phone is blinking with a voicemail, that after some investigation, ends up being his father wishing him luck on his competition and that he'll try to show up if the burglary case he's working on doesn't take up too much of his time. Scott's left the same message via text, a grammar-butchered assurance that he's looking forward to seeing him and Derek smash the opponents.

He can't stomach more than half an orange for breakfast, fully prepared to be guzzling Gatorade the moment he gets into Finstock's grip, and the idea of Derek going through exactly the same routine, give or take some of the poise that Stiles is missing, is oddly mollifying. Stiles packs his skates, grabs his bag, and all but floors it to the rink in time to catch the van Finstock has at the ready for him and Derek. Finstock's leaning against the car tapping his foot against the ground hard and fast enough to jumpstart an earthquake, Derek leaning next to him in a Henley that makes Stiles want to grab him by the shoulders and burrow into a good morning hug that lasts for at least three hours.

"I'm glad the princess got herself out of the bed in time to make it," Finstock spits from the van, already clambering in and banging against the roof to get Stiles to hustle, and Stiles has been working alongside the guy long enough to know to just ignore his pre-show nerves that always translate into rudeness.

"Morning," Derek tells him from around his thermos. He looks sleep-mussed and sturdy all at the same time, and Stiles follows him into the van and scrambles into the back where the light isn't quite as bright and nerve-wracking. He goes to buckle himself into the left side, but then Derek surprises him by tucking his arm around Stiles' shoulder and scooting imperceptibly closer to him. Stiles dearly hopes that Finstock is slow enough that he'll see the two of them and think close-knit camaraderie rather than pair-skaters-turned-boyfriends getting in a snuggle in the back of a van that's definitely supposed to be all business.

Their subtlety, however, very quickly diminishes as Stiles starts pressing slow kisses to Derek's neck and reveling in how Derek starts squirming beside him, Finstock too concerned with barking directions at the driver to fret over Finstock whipping around and noticing their pg-13 and climbing temporary love shack in the back of the car. Derek retaliates each gentle suck of Stiles' mouth under his ear with a teasing squeeze to his inner thigh, squeezes that are about to make this ride very awkward if Stiles pops a boner right when they're unloading and getting checked in.

By the time the ride is over, both Derek and Stiles rather disturbed and horny, Derek's face so grumpily frazzled because he's currently being denied the right to ravish Stiles in public, Stiles can only hope that the extra kick to their hormones will give them an aggressive edge to the competition. They check in with Stiles practically hopping off the walls, his habitual pre-show nerves practically tickling his organs. Derek rubs slow, rhythmic circles into his back after they're all settled to ease his tension, and Stiles gets only slightly annoyed by how composed Derek remains through all the proceedings. It's practically routine for Stiles to nearly throw up before a show even if he knows the moves well enough to perform them all in his sleep, one of the reasons why caffeine on competition day is an absolute forbiddance, and on his left is Derek, composed and calm without a single nervous tick in any limb.

"Do you never get nervous?" Stiles asks, if only to keep his mouth occupied.

Derek shrugs easily, idly polishing his skates as a few late contestants rush by them. The pre-show rink is always a great place to be, full of a hysteria that's practically tangible enough to taste on his tongue, with shrieking coaches and sobbing skaters ducking into corners.

"I know we're going to be fine," Derek says simply, so simply that Stiles believes him and feels the need to lean over and kiss him. It's soft, warm, and everything Stiles needs to suck the unnecessary urge to worry out of him.

Derek pulls away just in time as Finstock thunders up to them, thrusting ridiculously overpriced vending machine water bottles into their fingers and rubbing his hands together eagerly before he squeezes between them on the bench and takes a seat. The nervous tick in his ankle matches Stiles'.

"Okay, so I think we got this game in the bag," Finstock whispers conspiratorially to both of them. "I'm about ninety percent sure."

"And the leftover ten percent?"

"Well, I saw Reyes and Boyd stalk in here like they own the place, and God knows they think they're the reincarnations of Michelle Kwan."

"Michelle Kwan isn't dead, Coach," Stiles points out helpfully.

Finstock ignores him. "Oh, and Stilinski, you'll be happy to know that Adrian Harris is one of the judges, and we all know you're not exactly his favorite figure skater ever since your dad found out about all of his drunken streaking sprees."

Stiles groans and Derek sends him a look like he'll definitely want more than just the abridged version of that tale later. It's definitely a story for a better time.

"We can handle it," Derek says gruffly, clearly not letting anything break through his confidence. Stiles supposes it's a result of years of dealing mind games from other competitors, and he's really not sure if he admires or hates his fortitude.

"That's what I like to hear!" Finstock says, clapping them both on the back. It's a little hard and leaves a little sting, but Stiles feels the love nonetheless.

* * *

If there's anything Stiles knows about figure skating, it's to _never never never never never ever_ watch his competition.

He does a fair amount of research beforehand to cover all his bases, but he doesn't lean on the railing and watch how they twirl and spin and captivate the crowd while supportive, glittery posters are waved about frantically in the stadium. It works like a charm to kill his self-esteem, and he's been at enough competitions to push in his ear buds, listen to some Kids 88, and block out the world until he's up.

He risks only a glance at Vernon Boyd and Erica Reyes, Erica in a fiery red, studded number and her partner in a deep blue outfit. He only catches a few twirls and a blur of Erica's skirt, the roar of the crowd ultimately pushing him away to focus on stretching and finishing off his water bottle.

He returns to where Derek's stretching in the corner while a camera pans over the hallway, reminding Stiles that they'll make it to some cute local channel tonight or the exclusive figure skating channel up in the six hundreds that nobody's going to pay for. He's wearing a positively ridiculous outfit that matches Derek's but Derek happens to rock much more than he does with the way his body fills every crevice, but he's too busy mentally going over ever jump and tuck to fidget with the spandex. He feels very much like he'd like to hobble over to the bathroom and throw up the protein bar Finstock force-fed him a few hours ago, but just as he's considering it, Derek's arm loops around his chest and pulls him into the corner where he was stretching his calves.

"Calm down," Derek tells him in a low, soothing tone that rumbles through Stiles like honey. He meets Derek's eyes, the same eyes he's been staring into for months now trying to count every shade of the color wheel he could find, and it does manage to calm him down. In that moment, Stiles can't imagine being a single skater anymore, being nothing but a bundle of his own nerves with nobody to freak out with him or soothe mollifying nothings into his ear.

"Thanks," Stiles says, slowly exhaling. Derek follows the movement to make sure he's not keeping any deep breaths in and then leans in to cup his head and gently kiss his forehead. It's the kind of affection Stiles never would've expected from Derek all those months ago when he met the guy's stony gaze in the skating rink for the first time, soft and romantic and almost familial in a way that Derek could be Stiles' family.

He rewinds his rapidly forming future for a moment to focus on the present, pulling Derek into a kiss when he tries to pull back. He smiles on Derek's lips when he instantly feels him respond, angling their mouths together for a quick, reassuring kiss that is ten times better than the forehead smooch.

Then Erica and Boyd's scores are announced to the jubilation of the crowd, and the resounding cheer echoes so loudly that Stiles instantly knows it's a formidable score. Erica and Boyd come out into the hall in sweatshirts draped over their glittery outfits, their twined hands swinging between their bodies while their trainer comes hurrying after them. She actually smiles at Stiles as she walks by, a tiny quirk of her lips, and Stiles can't even make out if it's friendly encouragement or her own satisfaction with her score. Derek's thumb prods the inside of his palm and he snaps back to the task at hand. Finstock reels them into a huddle.

"Break a leg," Finstock says, his eyes as wide as trash can lids and his fingers shaking as he tucks his arms across his chest. "But not really. I don't wanna see the ambulance loading you into a truck, okay, Stilinski?"

"Got it, Coach."

"I believe in you guys," Finstock says, and his expression looks slightly manic, like he'll spend the majority of their performance with his eyes shut and his fist in his mouth to keep from screeching. Stiles feels oddly doted on. "So go out there and _destroy_ those ice fairies!"

Stiles whoops his approval. Finstock gives them both a rough bear hug that knocks the wind out of Stiles' lungs and ends up with Stiles getting a mouthful of Finstock's jacket collar and Derek's shoulder jammed into his chest. All of it is uncomfortable in the best sort of way.

* * *

Being out on the ice feels surreal. It's like that each time. Stiles skates out to the middle, eyes downcast, and then he looks up and takes it all in—the vast blank canvas of the ice, practically begging to be marked up with the scratches of his own skates, the murmuring judges, the silent crowd that's practically holding its breath in anticipation. He looks up and catches sight of a behemoth orange sign that's practically suffocating half the left side of the stadium, held up by his beaming father and Scott.

Then there's Derek's breath on his jaw, a tiny gust of warmth as he positions himself in their opening stance, and that's when the first note of their performance song hits.

Stiles breaks away, gaining speed, his brain one step ahead with each flourish of his arm and jump of his feet as he grazes the side of the rink and feels Derek on the opposite end of the rink. He's far away, but Stiles swears he can hear the slide of his skates on the ice, each tiny movement just like they've practiced for weeks.

Then Stiles skates forward, and so does Derek, and in one fluid second Stiles grabs him by the hips and lifts him, and Derek lets him.

It _works_, it flows together and it doesn't end in disaster, and Stiles manages to return him to the ground without anybody cracking a skull in half. The best part is that Stiles can practically feel the trust oozing from Derek's limbs as he brings him to his feet again, swapping positions so Derek can pitch him up into the air. He looks at Derek's face, concentrated and nearly shining in the glow of the white rink, and thinks he's never trusted another being as much as he does Derek right now.

That's the thing about pair skating that he never expected—he'd heard the stories of the trust and the bonds, but always wrote it off as some far off myth, a story concocted to inspire figure skaters, but it's _true_. There's some things that only skaters get, like the feeling of letting the ice take over and just sliding where it took him, the feeling of freshly sharpened blades twirling on a smooth surface, feeling the cool air whip his face and feeling the exhaustion of waking up at five in the morning to train. They were all things that his father and Scott never understood because they weren't part of the corner of his world where he escaped to the ice and relished in every jump he landed and every bruise he sported as symbols of his effort. And Derek, the guy who Stiles wrote off as being as cold as the ice he skated on, he was intrinsically part of this world and could relate to all of those moments.

Derek's hands slide away from his waist as he brings him back to his feet and Stiles catches a quirk of a smile before they continue their routine.

It all goes uphill from there.

* * *

Their short program is basically the best program to ever be seen in figure skating history. Stiles may be exaggerating, but he's shamelessly on cloud nine and practically pitches himself into Derek's arms after the song ends, and Derek doesn't even stumble back because he's definitely expecting it. It's exactly like he's always seen on television, how the crowd gets to their feet and the skaters throw themselves into an emotionally loaded embrace, somebody always crying, whether it be the coach or the skaters or the little rink ninjas who grab the roses and vanish from sight again.

He feels Derek's breath on his ear as they hug, a tight hug that doesn't even let him breathe, and when they pull away Stiles sends a huge thumbs-up to where he knows Scott and his father are sitting and applauding. He definitely deserves that applause; he and Derek _killed_ it.

Then they bow to the crowd, nothing but a blur of colors, and the moment they step out of the rink Finstock is accosting them, pushing skate guards into their hands and yelling monosyllabic praise in their ears like that's all his vocabulary is allowing him to form into words.

"Anything but first place and this competition is _rigged_!" Finstock is yelling, ushering them toward the bench and throwing his arms around their shoulders. The whole place is freezing, but Stiles isn't cold in the slightest, all his limbs burning with the lingering adrenaline of a successful performance. Around Finstock's back, Derek's hand fists the fabric at Stiles' back while the numbers are announced.

Stiles can't look away. He never does. He stares at the scores like they're bringing him the answers to life's deepest questions, unable to squeeze his eyes shut like when the first dip of the roller coaster stings his eyes but he still can't force himself to shut out the sight. He stares at the numbers, brain moving at one hundred miles per hour, but he doesn't comprehend the meaning behind them until the crowd hollers and Finstock gets to his feet in silent triumph. _First place_. They've made _first place_, and that's getting past Harris' skeptical four eyes, which is already a miracle in of itself. Derek smiles at him from his right, a small secretive smile that Stiles hopes means _victory sex tonight_, and he smiles right back.

It might only be the short program, but it might Stiles think that they're going to blow the competition off the ice during the long program too.

* * *

They come home with a gold medal, a promise that regionals is in sight, and Finstock so gleeful he sings show tunes the whole ride home.

"You know you're never going to work alone, right, Stilinski?" Finstock tells him, dead seriously, while they stop for celebratory hot dogs on the ride back. He's got an iced coffee in his hand and Stiles definitely thinks the guy should lay off the caffeine for a whole week after today. "And Hale, if you think I'm ever going to let you go again, you're so wrong I'm glad you've got all that pretty to make up for what you're lacking elsewhere."

Derek doesn't even look insulted, and that, Stiles thinks, is character growth combined with the inevitability of eventually getting fond of Finstock. The man's like that annoying pop song always being played on the radio that can't be escaped until you give in and put it on your iPod.

"Fine by me, Coach," says Stiles. Derek's ankle bumps into his, and Stiles thinks that maybe it's a thank you, like _thanks for keeping up with all of my bullshit_ or _thanks for not giving up on me_ or _I actually like working with you too_.

* * *

Alexei Yagudin once said "we have this joke in figure skating that if you wake up in the morning and you aren't hurting, then you are dead," and Stiles thinks he was absolutely right.

He's aching everywhere, from the curve of his back to the dull throb in his calves, and you'd think that after years of training under Finstock's tough love he'd be toned enough that his muscles would be used to the abuse, but he still feels like he's a beanpole who overexerted himself on the treadmill. Stiles has long accepted the fact that his body will forever be at conflict with his exercise routine.

The arm draped over his chest and the body flush and warm against his, though, is definitely making the pain a bit more bearable this morning.

The body, dead to the world, stirs and rumbles against Stiles' torso as Derek comes to life. The guy sleeps like an overheated rock, completely immovable, excruciatingly heavy and hard to move, and with warm limbs that wrap around Stiles like seaweed. The warmth emanating from Derek's chest against his side, sticky on any other occasion, is pleasantly luring him back to slumber even as sunlight streams through his curtains and birds attempt to twitter him awake. Stiles turns his head to catch a glimpse of a side of Derek only a handful of people have ever had the pleasure to witness: his sleepy, groggy, totally peaceful face of the morning. He slides a thumb down Derek's jaw where the stubble grinds over his skin like sandpaper.

"You, my friend, need a shave," Stiles says to Derek, whose hand tightens around Stiles' hipbone. His arm splays diagonally down his chest, a hot line of flesh that's gently interesting his sleepy morning hormones. "I don't really like looking like I have rug burn on my face after I make out with you."

"I don't think you mind as long as you get to make out with me," Derek says, finally opening his eyes. His voice sounds sleep-tinged and grumpy, the type of voice that makes Stiles want to stay in bed all day with him.

"True enough," Stiles says. "Do you want to just stay here all day?"

He trails his hand up and down the small of Derek's back, blissfully naked and warm. His back flutters until his light ministrations and his thighs squirm against Stiles' legs. If nothing else, Stiles' persuasive techniques are positively lethal.

"We're supposed to have lunch with your dad at eleven," Derek points out helpfully, but he sounds swayed nonetheless, nose nuzzling under Stiles' ear.

"Yeah, and he'll understand if we're a little late," Stiles says. His muscles ache as he stretches under Derek's body and he can think of a million ways he can relax them, mutual massages and happy endings only one of them. He can also think of ways he can overwork them as well, a few creative positions only the start of his train of thought. "We're hard working figure skaters, we deserve a few breaks."

"We are, aren't we?" Derek murmurs, and Stiles can feel his smile against his neck. "I suppose we do."

Stiles silences any of Derek's further protests with his mouth, conveniently turns off his phone in case Finstock decides to prepare an impromptu weekend training session, and thinks yeah, a few hours off the ice won't kill them.


End file.
